Ferry Sark - Carteret

Sark – Carteret with Manche Iles Express

This route links Sark with Carteret, operated by Manche Iles Express. The two ferry terminals are about 41 kilometres (22 nautical miles) apart in a straight line. Use the search engine above for current timetables and fares, or use the Direct Ferries button at the top of the page to compare the sailings.

Launched in 2005 by the département of La Manche, Manche Iles Express links Granville, Barneville-Carteret and Diélette with Jersey, Guernsey, Sark and Alderney on two ferries owned by the département. Sailings were suspended in 2021, resumed in 2022 and are now supported by the islands too.

Sark

Sark has no cars and no street lighting, but its history is anything but sleepy. Cornish miners came in the 1830s to dig for silver in the cliffs of Little Sark, and the ruins of the mines can still be seen at Port Gorey. In October 1942 a dozen British commandos landed in the dark below the Hog's Back, took a German prisoner and set off a chain of events that is believed to have contributed to Hitler's Commando Order; the raid is still remembered on the island. Today most visitors come for the walking. La Coupée, the narrow ridge joining Great and Little Sark, stands about 80 metres above the sea. Railings were fitted in 1900, and before then children are said to have crawled across on their hands and knees when the wind was strong. Bicycles and horse-drawn carriages are the main ways to get around.

Carteret

Few small Normandy villages have left such a mark on the map. The Carteret family took its name from this stretch of the Cotentin coast, where its ancestors held the Barony of Carteret, and members of the family went on to shape the Channel Islands and far beyond. Sir George Carteret, a loyal servant of Charles II, was granted lands in what became New Jersey. Philip Carteret, born at Trinity Manor in Jersey in 1733, sailed around the world for the Royal Navy and in July 1767 discovered Pitcairn Island, later settled by the mutineers of the Bounty. Barneville-Carteret itself is a family seaside town of broad sandy beaches and dunes, with a lighthouse on the Cap de Carteret and, in summer, a passenger ferry link to Jersey.